The present invention is directed to an opto-electronic module for integration of active electro-optical components and passive waveguides for optical coupling to external waveguides.
The optical coupling between opto-electronic components critically determines the properties of opto-electronic systems or, respectively, the collaboration of these components with transmission media such as, for example, optical fibers connected thereto. The optical coupling should be optimally effective given simple and cost-beneficial technical realization. A monolithic integration with waveguides on substrates having larger dimensions is required given opto-electronic components having extremely small dimensions (below 100 .mu.m) since a mechanical handling (transport or, respectively, mounting) of such individual micro-structure elements is possible only with difficulty or is even impossible. Arrangements wherein the active and the passive components are manufactured in the same material system have been proposed for such an optical coupling of active components and passive waveguides in, for example, the publication by T. Ido et al, "High-Speed MQW Electroabsorption Optical Modulators Integrated with Low-Loss Waveguides", in IEEE Photonics Technology Letters, Vol. 7, pp. 170 through 172 (1995) and in the publication by R. Ben-Michael et al, "A Bi-Directional Transceiver PIC for Ping-Pong Local Loop Configurations Operating at 1.3-.mu.m Wavelength", in IEEE Photonics Technology Letters, Vol. 7, pp. 1424 through 1426 (1995). The installation of adiabatic tapers (sections of a waveguide tapering in one direction) also ensues upon employment of the same material components. The disadvantage is thereby that the manufacturing methods of such arrangements are extremely involved. In particular, they require multiple epitaxy steps and a considerable use of the semiconductor materials.